Style Crisis

OK that title, including the word "crisis," is a bit dramatic. Everything is quite fine over here. And maybe that's the problem.

Every time things get good and relatively easy, I start looking around my house and feeling unsatisfied. It's like my psyche knows to not even go there when there are real trials and tribulations that need my full attention. But when things are good, it goes there. Often.

I'm realizing that I'm quite random when it comes to home decor. And I'm OK with that. For now. I don't think I really know what I want our house to look like. When Marsh and I married, it was such a whirlwind. Graduating college, moving, getting pregnant right away, moving again, living with our parents for stents, living with Janson for stents (ha), starting a teaching job while being 6 months pregnant, leaving my teaching job to be a full-time mom to 3 kids under the age of 4...wow. Home decor took a back seat. Not even a back seat. It's more like it got thrown out the car all together. We basically just ran to Dillards or Bed Bath & Beyond in the spare seconds of our sanity and picked up a bunch of stuff to fill up our home as fast as possible. It's not bad stuff. It's just not me at all. So now I'm working on phasing it out (while also being on a tight budget).

The problem is, I'm not really confident I know what I want to replace these phased out items with. I want a house like Jones Design Company, but more color. Industrial undertones, but soft and frilly, too. Oh ya...and some mid century modern stuff. Ya confused yet? Because I sure am. I can't decide which of these styles I can seamlessly mix and which will just look wrong together. Sigh. #WhiteGirlProblems, right?

So I'm starting with something that I know I want to do. Paint these cabinets. These perfectly new and functional cabinets that have nothing wrong with them (cue Marshall's dirty look), but everything wrong with them.

They're so...builder's grade. And boring. I'm hoping that throwing some white on them will give the kitchen just the shockingly refreshing change I need. Can I even hope that they'll look as good as Jones Design Company's? I think I'll just stick with hoping that I don't totally botch them up. I'm nervous!

More details to come soon :)

Lions & Ladies

Well, as you've probably noticed, my blog just got a little make over! My friend that designs the prettiest things made the header for me. I'm in love. And there's even a little button that links to my new Etsy shop called Lions & Ladies. I think I mentioned before that I had started a little business. It's been so fun. I make bow ties for little boys (and even some for big boys men). I also keep swearing that I'm going to list some headbands for baby girls but haven't gotten around to it quite yet. I do make them, though.

Why Lions & Ladies? Well, I'll tell you why. It's just some Iron & Wine lyrics. When I started this blog over three years ago, I titled it "Love and Some Verses." In my very first post I explained that I chose that name partly because it was a song title from one of my favorite artists, Sam Beam (Iron & Wine). His music is folky, dramatic, nostalgic, full of beautiful lyrics and imagery, and kind of depressing. Everything I love! Ha.

When I think about my life, it kinda plays like a movie in my head. And Iron & Wine songs make up the soundtrack. For example, if I was even 5 minutes early to a day in high school, you could find me sitting in my car listening to Such Great Heights from the Garden State album. During my first spell of homesickness in college, Sodom, South Georgia played non-stop on my iPod (which is weird because I'm not even from Georgia haha). When Marshall and I got back together for the final time, I was obsessing over The Trapeze Swinger. I listened to Love Vigilantes on repeat during those first few weeks of Laney's life when I was fighting the baby blues and learning what motherhood felt like. Peng! 33 is Laney's favorite song. It calmed her as a baby and is the song in the slideshow of her first year. Call Your Boys was the anthem of the summer right after Parker & Brooks joined us in this world. And Kingdom of the Animals is currently what L, P, B and I listen to in the car during our daily drives.

So, whenever I need to give something a name, it just makes sense to me to use these songs. No deep meaning or anything. And no real lions. Just songs that I love.

#Mexico2013

Speaking of my cup running over with blessings, here's another one. Marsh and I got to go to Mexico 2 weeks ago for FOUR DAYS! And what made it even better was that most of my favorite people in the world were there, too. It was uh-mazing. I hadn't ever been away from the kids for more than a night before this, so by the time we were flying back home, I was physically ACHING to kiss those three messy faces.

But I won't lie, it was a nice break.

We'd been looking forward to this since last year when my good, long-time friend Kate got engaged to Walt (aka Crazy Dub), the awesome guy she met while working in DC. That's right; he's new to the crew and already has a nickname. He wastes no time. And by "looking forward to this," I mean my friends and I had been obnoxiously texting about it and hash tagging everything possible #Mexico2013 for like 6 months.

And it lived up to everything I hoped it would be. Kate looked gorgeous while marrying the man of her dreams, I spent my days sipping frozen margaritas with my very best friends (minus a few who we're greatly missed), and there were no dirty diapers in sight. I even had time to reteach myself how to straighten my hair and apply make up.

Here we are in all our glory.

My Cup Runneth Over

Gah. It's blowing my mind these days how good God's plans are. His all-encompassing "plan" is good, but also his plan for ME is good. And even knowing this, my nature as a human is to beat my head against a wall and try to force my life to look like what I think it should and be miserable. But if I give up those endeavors, and just seek HIM, my heart is more fulfilled than ever before.

Right now, my cup runneth over. Actually, ALWAYS, my cup runneth over. But right now it's running over with happiness, joy, prosperity, and wonderful things in this world. I'm so THANKFUL for this season in my life. I want to document this season so that when it changes, I can look back and remember that His plans are good. When the season changes (be it tomorrow or 5 years from now) and I experience grief or loss or sadness or depression or disappointment, I can be thankful that not every season feels that way. And even then, my cup can STILL runneth over. With Jesus. And Grace. And peace. And hope. And eternal purpose.

This life I'm living right now is better than I could have ever dreamed it up to be. Praise God.

I'm having so much fun with the kids these days that I don't even have time to take pictures of it or blog about it. Ha.
And I opened an Etsy shop doing something I love. Go check it out! LionsandLadies.etsy.com.

But I'm having to daily remind myself not to get too obsessed with it (we know I'm quite obsessive haha). Because it's just a fun little blessing. It's not my purpose. It's not my prize. It's just another little thing to be thankful for.